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And we begin... Part Deux


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The percentages don't mean much against last year. It just seems silly to change up what has worked for several Falls now. Plus the old maps divided up ice and snow where as these new maps just consider both the same, which doesn't always have an accurate representation as noted earlier this month were the snow was outpacing the ice compared to last year. These new maps wouldn't show that representation.

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Pixel counting is back by popular demand.

Giant gains everywhere.

ims2011268.gif

ims2011269.gif

ims2010269.gif

SNOW PIXEL COUNTS (total white minus 8000 [approximate number of white pixels that are map lines and not snow])

Yesterday: 778

Today: 1295

One year ago today: 1590

ICE PIXEL COUNTS (total yellow)

Yesterday: 1459

Today: 1463

One year ago today: 1565

SNOW COVER (courtesy InstantWeatherMaps.com)

00Z: 3.34%

06Z: 3.47%

12Z: 3.68%

18Z: 4.01%

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This is comparing only to the last 15 years of climo and it isnt comparing to last year, that's why pixel counting does matter when comparing to last year.

As I said before it is easy to compare the the last two years in terms of areal coverage (same thing as pixels) using FSU.

Last year had 4.0% coverage, this year 3.3%.

Multiply the difference in percents (.7%) by 98.5 million sq miles and you have the number of sq miles this year has more or less than last year.

And really is it so important that we know to the exact sq mile? All we really need to know is this year is below last year is above as you can quickly see from just glancing at this chart.

nhtime-1year.png

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Pixel counting is back by popular demand.

Giant gains everywhere.

SNOW PIXEL COUNTS (total white minus 8000 [approximate number of white pixels that are map lines and not snow])

Yesterday: 778

Today: 1295

One year ago today: 1590

ICE PIXEL COUNTS (total yellow)

Yesterday: 1459

Today: 1463

One year ago today: 1565

SNOW COVER (courtesy InstantWeatherMaps.com)

00Z: 3.34%

06Z: 3.47%

12Z: 3.68%

18Z: 4.01%

778 to 1295? Thats quite the spike.

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Enormous gains today, mostly in Asia; yesterday modest gains, mostly in Canada

ims2011269.gif

ims2011270.gif

ims2011271.gif

ims2010270.gif

ims2010271.gif

SNOW PIXEL COUNTS (total white minus 8000 [approximate number of white pixels that are map lines and not snow])

9/26/11: 1295

9/27/11: 1413

9/28/11: 2117

9/27/10: 1692

9/28/10: 1840

ICE PIXEL COUNTS (total yellow)

9/26/11: 1459

9/27/11: 1454

9/28/11: 1488

9/27/10: 1606

9/28/10: 1628

SNOW COVER (courtesy InstantWeatherMaps.com)

9/27 00Z: 4.04%

9/27 06Z: 4.20%

9/27 12Z: 4.35%

9/27 18Z: 4.54%

9/28 00Z: 4.27%

9/28 06Z: 4.42%

9/28 12Z: 4.51%

9/28 18Z: 4.66%

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I looked through the thread and didn't see but can someone explain why we track this? Does this have a bearing on our winter?

Fall northern hemisphere snowcover is very well correlated with the following winter. More snowcover = colder winter, less snowcover = warmer winter...in a nutshell.

More science here: http://web.mit.edu/jlcohen/www/papers/Cohen_SaitoGRL03.pdf

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Fall northern hemisphere snowcover is very well correlated with the following winter. More snowcover = colder winter, less snowcover = warmer winter...in a nutshell.

More science here: http://web.mit.edu/jlcohen/www/papers/Cohen_SaitoGRL03.pdf

Thanks for the explanation and that paper. The graphs on the last page are pretty interesting!

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Just in the last few days and only because we haven't had a big increase in snowcover. At this time of year, they seem to come in batches, with plateaus in between.

plus, there's a 2-3 day delay with the maps

there was quite a jump between Fri and Sat, so that may change by Tues or Wed

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There are gains on the GFS 5 day snow cover forecast, but the gains are really not that large for this time of year. Almost no snow falls west of 90E.

initialization first, then 5 day:

NH_SNOWC_sfc_000.gif

NH_SNOWC_sfc_120.gif

I can't see your images, but I was referring to the ensemble packages over the mid-long range.

With a likely -AO winter, NH snowcover should generally average above normal as it has in the past several winters.

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